Royals plan to start a new tradition this season, and they seek the help of KC fans
Things will look a little different at Kauffman Stadium on Opening Day.
For starters, the Boulevard Brewing Company smokestack beyond the right-center wall will say Bluevard. A blue light will illuminate the back of the Crown Vision board, too.
And most notable will be the 15 foot by 9 foot flag near the Rivals sports bar. It will have just one word: Home, in the script typeface of the Royals’ uniforms.
The flag will fly during all home stands, starting with the 2022 season opener April 7 against the Cleveland Guardians. All of that is part of the Royals’ new initiative, Bring Out The Blue.
It is the Royals’ hope that fans and local businesses will join with the team and paint the town, well, blue.
“If you think about kittens, they are born and just innately they know they need to go to the litter box. Well, kids around here when they’re born, they know that Fridays you dress in red,” said Tony Snethen, Vice President of Brand Innovation and Agency lead of the Royals’ Pine Tar Collective. “And we didn’t really have anything like that with a 162 game season and 81 games here at home.
“How do you create something that the city can rally around? And so we started thinking about the idea of Bring Out The Blue and supporting the boys as they come back into town. And so we’re really focusing on it being every time they come back from a road trip or, of course, Opening Day to start season where we really want to just flip the switch on the city and turn everything blue.“
During the season, the Royals usually return home from a road trip at night, and it is Snethen’s hope that Kansas City will be awash in blue as the players make their way from the airport to Kauffman Stadium.
When the Royals start a home series, the team will raise the huge flag so everyone at Kauffman Stadium and passing by the Truman Sports Complex will know the team is at The K.
“We created a custom flag that’s shaped like a pennant that we’ll raise at the beginning of every home stand, kind of like our banging of the drum like the Chiefs do, and then we’ll keep it raised the entire home stand,” Snethen said. “We will have a spotlight on it so people driving down I-70 can see it and know that the boys are in town. We’re going to light up the back of Crown Vision with blue lights. It’s kind of our bat signal if you will.”
The Royals hope to have replicas of the flags available in the team shop and elsewhere. It’s their desire to have fans fly the flags at their homes and place of work.
And on the first day of each new home stand, Snethen said, the team hopes fans around town will wear their Royals jerseys and caps. It’ll be sort of like the Chiefs’ Red Friday but only with Royals blue.
It’s all part of the effort to bring the blues to Kansas City. Well, the color blue.
“We’re giving people total free rein to treat it how they want but essentially the way I view it is it’s the city basically wrapping their arms around the club when they get back into town,” Snethen said, “and kind of rolling out the blue carpet for them.”
This story was originally published March 28, 2022 at 8:31 AM.
